Podcast #82: Parashat Re'eh

Shlomo and Elisha discuss their summer experiences and the importance of creating meaningful experiences for their grandchildren. They then discuss Parshat Re'eh, the longest Parshat in the book of Deuteronomy, which focuses on blessings and curses. They explore the idea of living a life of purpose and avoiding a life of insignificance. They emphasize the importance of working out the body, mind, and soul to live a fulfilling life. They also discuss the significance of hearing in Judaism and the importance of selective listening in a world full of negativity. They share the idea of making others happy as a source of blessing and fulfillment. Good morning Shlomo, good morning Elisha, good morning to our listeners Yeah good morning and here we are it's a Wednesday morning and Shlomo is finishing his what was it a week long? How long was the Kaytanat Safda? A summer long, two months Two months oh my god, two months of many of the young grandchildren are at home and Sharona, Shlomo's wife and Shlomo together are doing an amazing job giving them an experience that they will never forget and they have this experience every single summer so they really drill into their soul, love and family commitment and it's really really beautiful So today it's coming to a final end with a big barbeque Ceramics workshop up north with our friend Ela, Edith's daughter who is an expert of ceramics workshops and then back for a big barbeque at our place So if anyone wants really good ideas there is a great ceramics workshop up north and a great barbeque in Shlomo's house Exactly And today we're, this week we're with Parshat Re'eh And boy is this a fascinating Parshat Elisha and we did this before, this is the second time through it but each time you find new things and you know this and you've pointed this out to us every time you read the Torah you find something new because we are different people when we read it and we see different things provided we look and we really listen but this Parshat is really something so as usual the numbers Elisha, let's run the numbers the 47th Parshat in the Torah 1932 words, it's the longest Parshat in the book of Deuteronomy and there are loads of mitzvot like seeds of pomegranates 55 mitzvot, 17 positive and 38 negative but I think the real message is not Elisha it's not in the mitzvot but what lies beneath and on top and surrounding the mitzvot and it starts in that first sentence I studied creative writing Elisha a novelist, famous novelist at Princeton Joyce Carol Oates and we learned that the first sentence is crucial because it pulls the reader in Moshe is speaking to the people and this first sentence is 7 words and boy he gets our attention Elisha Re'eh Ani Anokhi Noten Lifnechem HaYom Bracha Oklala Behold I am putting before you this day a blessing and a curse and that of course is the essence of I think what we learned from the Torah which is how to live to be a blessing commandment given to Abraham and how to avoid becoming a curse and I really dislike the translation curse of Oklala even though it seems obvious it seems to me more related to Kilkul which is like a breakdown like our lives break apart somehow and our relationships break apart because we just don't manage things right so we have a choice Moshe and Re'eh is singular Elisha it's not plural but Ani Anokhen Lifnechem which is plural wait a second so he's talking to me but talks to everybody as well and the reason is Elisha because this is about our community it's about our relationship as individuals with the people around us with our community that's very beautiful that's a really beautiful opening very beautiful and that's a great idea the idea of Kilkul that's beautiful and it's directly related to Oklala Kuf and Lamed the letters are there and people are very familiar with the word Tikkun Tikkun Ulam so Kilkul is the opposite of Tikkun and also related to Kal because how do you get into trouble? you pick the easy road I have a habit Elisha I've taught it to my kids as well some of them do it to try to do one hard thing everyday because Elisha when you get older lots of people around you want to make life easier for you I understand that it's done out of love but it's not too helpful we've got to keep the body moving we've got to keep the muscles working we've got to keep the brain moving so don't baby yourself do hard things everyday just to keep getting used to it so beautiful Shlomo and I think you're saying so many important things here I think first of all the word Kalala comes from the word Kal I think that's where it comes from where basically when you're when you're cursing someone Lekalel when you're cursing someone you're making them light but not light in a positive sense you're making them like like a feather blowing in or a leaf blowing in the wind kind of you're so insignificant that I'm just going to go like and you're going to be and you're going to just like fly away and the opposite of Kalala I think we've discussed this once already before is Kavod from the word Kavid heavy so if Kalala is to be overly light and it's kind of difficult in English because because light is such a positive word and even weight wise being light is like you know be a bit lighter why are you so heavy? but when you're so light that you're just blowing in the wind that's already a curse and the opposite of that is Kavod Kavid we have presence Kavod is like is presence so Bracha is presence you often like to call it like the Shechanti Betucham that God is present within us that's Kavod then we become heavy in a positive sense heavy with the presence of God and Kalala when we live a kind of life that makes us I don't know what a good word for that in English is that makes us like you know Elton John's song for Marilyn Monroe like a candle in the wind kind of thing it comes a little like a bit of air and wind and the candle blows out so you're teaching your children which is really beautiful you have physical muscles and you have mental muscles and you have emotional muscles and you have soul soulful muscles and you've got to work them on work them all and if you live an easy life then you'll atrophy is that the word? yes and if you but if you work out both body spirit mind and soul then boy you're going to the things worth doing Alisha are usually pretty hard and Kennedy once gave a famous speech in which he at Rice University in which he said we will go to the moon not because it's easy but because it's hard because it's challenging and Alisha this parasha as Rabbi Sacks points out is about seeing and hearing and the connection between them and you note in your parasha I just want to for those who are less familiar with Hebrew so the name of the parasha is Re'eh to see that's the name of the parasha see and yet we talk so much about listening as opposed to seeing exactly and Rabbi Sacks points out that Judaism unlike many other religions is a religion of hearing rather than seeing why? because we have no image of God and that's really important but the question is what kind of hearing? what kind of hearing? so the opening seven words which are crucial wait a second in Hebrew there's no et et which singles the object it's generic generic generic blessing in general right so I'm not giving you a specific blessing and a specific curse I'm giving you blessing in general and a curse in general exactly but we are challenged Alisha to go and find it and define it for ourself 55 mitzvot that's true but as Rambam points out those are means to an end those are not the the bracha so what in the world is the bracha and what is this got to do with seeing and hearing and you point out something important in your drasha you say that we commonly fault each other on our selective hearing because perhaps because it's so difficult to filter out sound there's a mechanism that allows us to choose what we want to hear compensating for not being able to block out sounds Alisha we are deaf to so many things and also blind to so many things I know you're very fond of William James the psychologist who became a religious philosopher and a theologian and he once said a doctor who became a psychologist and a theologian exactly and the brother of Henry James who's a famous novelist psychological novelist William James said this my experience is what I agree to attend to to see and hear only those items which I notice shape my mind so Alisha we are one big filtering system and we see and hear only things that we choose and this is crucial because for example Alisha I find that the media the television, social media are full of awful things because they seem to think that this is what attracts our attention and it's perpetual turn on the TV and you see awful things and if we continue to allow ourselves to see and hear that it's depressing it's horrendous and it can create what's called learned helplessness in psychology the world is a terrible place there's nothing I can do about it so we need to follow William James we need to hear and see selectively but in a way that's positive that creates a blessing and not a kill cool and not a curse I have another comment about that I found a Chinese saying Alisha there's so much wisdom in old Chinese sayings and this saying goes knowing others is wisdom knowing oneself is enlightenment I kind of want to turn it around I think that knowing others Alisha is enlightenment because that in my life that is where Braha is and really knowing others and making other people happy and I found a second answer I'll hear what you have to say about this in a moment in Disneyland a small story Alisha we brought our kids to Disneyland a long time ago in I guess it was Disney World in Florida Disney World and after a day of doing these incredible rides our son Ronin looked at us with big eyes and said Abba Emma this was the best day of my life we made him happy and it wasn't an accident when Disney hires people they're given training program and they're taught to implement a mantra the mantra is make people happy and even the street sweeper knows that he's there not just to sweep the streets he is there to make people happy so for me personally I find after many years some insights in this that making people happy is a source of Braha, not just for them for me myself but it's really not easy you have to be really really good at selective listening like William James says really really listening to people and caring about people and so much of our modern society is about me, about self actualization, self realization whole trend in psychology and that's supposed to bring us enlightenment but it's much more important to be practiced in listening to people and listening to other people what they really need, what they really want and it's pretty hard because that message is often as we say in Hebrew very quiet still voice wow Shlomo that's very rich it's really beautiful and indeed I love William James it's a great source of inspiration and I mean so much to comment on what you're saying and first of all I'd like to thank you for bringing those nuggets of wisdom there are a few things that come to mind, one is there's a great poem and I'm not going to quote it exactly because I don't have that kind of memory by Yehuda Michai it's called, if I'm not mistaken, it's called The Tourist and he describes in Jerusalem, he's from Jerusalem, he's no longer alive but the backdrop for all of his creativity is Jerusalem and he sees a group of tourists with their tour guide and the tour guide is pointing out to the walls of the city of Jerusalem and the tour guide is explaining these stones up from this year and the arch that you see over there, so and so built it and et cetera, he said I'm waiting for the day now it's not an exact recount of the poem I'm waiting for the day when the tour guide is going to say do you see that woman walking over there with a basket she's just coming back now from the market with some onions and potatoes and tomatoes she's going home to prepare dinner for her family when a tour guide will point that out and not a dead stone from 1000 years ago or whatever that's when blessing a big blessing will come out so I think that there's a big question of hearing, you're pointing out really beautifully and so is William James you've got to really listen carefully and the question is listen to what we can turn on the radio listen to the news and listen really carefully listen really carefully to the anchors like voice, tone of voice what is he not saying, what is he saying is that the word called upon to do and I think that the way I understand at least is that we're called to listen and you point out the Kol Nomadaka, the still silent voice or the silent still voice we're called out to listen to the divine in everything and to listen to the blessing in everything and not listen to the curse in everything, everything has a blessing and a curse, everything, the starts with that, I'm giving you a blessing and a curse and as you're pointing out with the help of William James, you get to choose where you want to what you want to give your attention to and what you want to listen to so what does it mean to listen to the blessing and not listen to the curse I don't think it means listen to only the good things, don't listen to the bad things, I think it's like listen to the quest for life, listen to this deep deep seeded like quest for joy, for happiness for life, for L'chaim and listen for that so in the event of the 7th of October I think I mentioned that already before but the first few days after the 7th of October we were all walking around like zombies and it was just too much to bear everyday the numbers of people that we knew were killed, we knew that many were killed but they only discovered bodies gradually it took a while and there was a sense of despair but then on the third day it was Tuesday so it was the 4th day I remember on Tuesday all of a sudden something in me switched there was a switch when I can't remember what triggered that switch but I suddenly realized, wait, I can listen to the atrocities I can listen to despair or I can listen to the amazing stories of bravery of human bravery, love camaraderie sacrifice even listen to that and all of a sudden the whole entire story changed and I snapped out of my zombie state and out of my depressed kind of temporary mode suddenly I returned back to myself it's only one example thank God we don't need heroism all the time but there is something to be said for living life heroically so choosing choosing blessing is choosing that which enhances enhances the human enhances life enhances goodness enhances caring all the things that you said enhances camaraderie, etc. and if we're attuned to that so if a person is sharing with us a really painful story so I'm not saying to disregard the pain of course not, of course not but even the pain the pain itself, we can hear it in two different ways probably even many more but in two essential ways is hear the pain of a life that wants to live fully and is struggling to live we can listen to that or we can listen to that, oh no that's terrible, that's really really terrible, now we need empathy as well, we certainly do need empathy but the empathy is what the person is really craving, the person is craving goodness, that person who is in pain is craving healing, is craving joy, etc. and that's really what that person is saying, not how life is terrible and miserable. So Alicia, in a nutshell you've kind of summed up something called active listening which is the art of really really listening to people and it doesn't mean active listening doesn't mean talking all the time, it means listening to find the real meaning which is hard and that includes by the way body language and two thirds of our communication is our face, our expressions, our body language, not just the words but I have a question Alicia Alicia, our Alicia, you are a superb listener, you listen to your flock, you know what we're up to, you know what we're doing you're deeply and sincerely interested, many rabbis listen but they do because they have to, but you really really care and it's easy to tell so were you born with this quality Alicia? Did you acquire the quality? Was your rabbinic study somehow involved in this? And how can we become better active listeners? Well that's a really unfair question First of all, thank you for the nice compliments, I don't have that sense of myself so thank you but it's also kind of embarrassing especially now it's all recorded although you've said it to me before and I appreciate it I don't know, I think I think we all need a compass, we all need a compass in our lives most of us, when we go to school, the compass that we receive at school that we're trained for is the compass of succeeding in life you've got to learn certain things and you've got to learn learning skills in order to succeed in life, so that's a certain compass that we have where the arrow is pointing success it doesn't have to be necessarily economical success, it can also be social success and status etc. and that's fair enough people need to succeed in life in order to as Maslow taught us, we need to thrive in order to reach higher realms but we're not really taught the compass of listening to the inner to the divine within listen to what really wants to be said listen to or rather, listen to what really wants to come forth during the month of Elul, which starts next week we're going to have a month-long Bet Mi Brash program devoted to Elul to prepare ourselves for the high holidays and the Sunday night classes, well the English is going to be Monday mornings so the Monday morning classes are going to be all about understanding the human will the human want we're going to explore four different philosophers Jewish philosophers one of them is Rav Kook, Gordon I left that at Gordon Henry Bergson and Eugene Gendlin and they all have a different but similar understanding of the driving force behind everything and they kind of call it the will, the want each one of them relates to it a bit differently and I think Henry Bergson who him and Rav Kook were both contemporaries he really impacted all the others in a really deep way he talks about there being this underlying force in the cosmos, in the universe and within the human being as well, that seeks to become, and that's the blessing, that is the blessing that's the sound, just like we have Simon Garfunkel, the sound of silence we have the sound of blessing the sound of blessing is listening to that which wants to manifest, wants to become as opposed to the forces that try to shut that down and dull it and so so we're going to be exploring all of that, and I think that I think that all of us have it inside of us, all of us first of all, all of us have that force inside of us, we all do, otherwise we would not be around, it's the force that animates everything and that is the force behind creation behind everything in creation but we're not trained to listen to it and what this parasha is telling us and your opening of this podcast is all about is like, notice what you're listening to, are you listening to the voice of fear, are you listening to the sound of hysteria, are you listening to the sound of etc, etc or are you listening to the sound of what wants to become evolve, flourish and bloom in the world got it, so Elisha I realize that you're uncomfortable when I praise you and you're uncomfortable especially in talking about yourself, but you did answer my question and the answer was that I think in your rabbinic studies you received a compass that is a reason for listening what are we listening for if you don't know what you're listening for, you can't be a good listener and you are listening for the divine in everything around us, for the presence of God, even in things that don't seem very godly and that's very, very important to know what you're listening for, but I want to add an appendix to that Elisha let's go to another ancient Chinese statement, which may not be ancient Chinese, everything is ancient Chinese Confucius used to say I see I take notice I hear, I remember I do I understand so listening, active listening listening for God, listening for the voice of God, very important okay so what, what next we have to do something we have to create the blessing and not just find it, but create it, shape it, make it happen and I learned this in an amazing speech of Kamala Harris she was nominated as the Democrat candidate for president, she made an acceptance speech at the Democratic Convention last Thursday and she talked about her childhood and her mother and her mother she said taught her, when you see injustice Kamala when you see something wrong do something and that's what helped make her become a prosecutor to be a prosecuting attorney, attorney general that puts the criminals away, the people who have done bad things and right injustice by bringing those who create injustice to to justice do something, I think that's an important addition to listening and finding braha but we also shape the braha ourselves in what we do right I agree and the only thing I'd like to add even though I don't know if it's a good strategic thing right now or a tactical thing to do as we're about to close but she was on the side of the prosecution, which is very important there's also the side of the defense and I think every single person there's always another side to the coin and always, always, always that's why there's a blessing and a curse and I think it's important to point out that even the curse the curse plays a role and it goes back to what you said about hardship earlier, the curse, if the curse didn't play a role in God's world then God would not create the curse and God is saying in this pascha, I give you both so the curse is also important and the question is what could be good about the curse? God, why don't you only give blessings? and perhaps we need the curse in order to grow and evolve when you gave your advice to your kids and now they're probably giving it to their own kids and you just shared with me also how your youngest son takes all the nephews and nieces before they're bar bat mitzvah on a two day challenge hike where he really challenges them and who did he get that from? from his dad and what he does is he sees challenges as something really good and so do you it helps build you, it helps build your muscle not just your physical muscle but your moral muscle and your spiritual muscle as well and the curse I think is there in order to to help us to help us make that choice to help us build who we were meant to be and bring a blessing to the world and do good in the world without the curse we would just be we would never evolve we would never grow we have time for a very short story very quick you're in charge of the time here our son our son Yochai was in a special unit he was intelligent did things that he can't speak about and will never learn about them to get into the unit you have to go through a really tough week in which the ones who are motivated are flunked out and included a run along the sand if you've ever run in the sand it is hard it is tough and Yochai tore a muscle 70 pound backpack he tore a muscle and the group went on ahead and he was limping along behind and the officer said Yochai if you can catch up with the group I'll let you continue if you can't catch up with them I'm flunking you out no games in this unit and he caught them he caught up with the group with a torn muscle so learning to do hard things is a part of finding the blessing and part of the blessing is making full use of all the talents that we've been given the New Testament has stories about talents about the person who buries the talent in the ground and the person who uses it to do good and later he is asked about this and of course the person who used the talent is praised and the one who buried it is criticized so yes we shape blessings and we do that by knowing ourselves but also by pushing ourselves a little bit it's part of life and it's good if we do that and help our kids because so many of us want to prevent our kids from the suffering and the challenges and the pain that we went through but it's part of life it's part of choosing the blessing and that's what course is all about so a torn muscle is a curse it's a curse and choose not to tear a muscle if you can avoid tearing a muscle don't tear a muscle take good care of yourself take good care of yourself and yet here was this curse as the seat for the blessing as the vector for a blessing for ever growing blessing and Yohay spent 8 years in the field did a lot of good things for his country made fast friends they've all done really well by the way so yes in the end was a blessing so thank you for all these stories and thank you for a rich podcast and thank you all for listening thanks for listening everyone Shabbat Shalom and enjoy the hardships and even the curses because they all bring blessings Amen